Home » Sunday » Now and Then
Yunnan’s Buddhist gems offer quiet beauty
Print Edition
大理三塔(DALI Santa) Three Pagodas of Chongsheng Temple
Standing about 1.5 kilometers northwest of the scenic Dali old town in southwest China’s Yunnan Province, the Three Pagodas of Chongsheng Temple are among the most exquisite and stately Buddhist architectures in existence in China today.
Three Pagodas, forming an equilateral triangle around the original site of the Chongsheng Temple, are also the oldest buildings one can find in Yunnan.
Featuring multiple eaves, all three were built of bricks and covered with white plaster. That means they fall into the category of multi-eaved brick pagoda in ancient Chinese architecture.
Qianxun Pagoda, the principal of the three, was constructed from 824 to 839 AD in the late Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907). It has 16 tiers and reaches a height of 69.13 meters, making it one of the tallest pagodas in the country.
Qianxun Pagoda is square shaped. Its foundation is surrounded by a stone railing with a carved stone lion sitting on each of its four corners.
The ground story of the pagoda is about 13 meters high and starting from the third and fourth stories, it begins to taper towards the top, giving an impression that it has a slightly bulging “belly.”
Each eave of the pagoda has a slight sag in the middle to make the four corners seem to turn upwards.
There’s also a carved niche shrine at the center of each façade of every story, housing a sitting Buddha statue. Four bronze sculptures perch on the four corners of the roof of the pagoda, designed to deter the legendary water monsters in the nearby Erhai Lake.
Overall, the structure looks well-balanced, stately and imposing.
The other two pagodas, the South Pagoda and the North Pagoda, were built during the 10th to 13th centuries and look like twins.
They are both built in the octagonal shape and are about the same height, 38.25 meters for the South Pagoda and 38.85 meters for the North Pagoda.
Both are solid brick buildings, unlike Qianxun, which is hollow from the first to eighth stories.
In addition, there are carved niche shrines, Buddha statues and lotus relief on the façade of each story of the two minor pagodas.
According to historical records, the Three Pagodas once housed more than 11,000 bronze Buddha statues, made out of more than 20 tons of bronze.
During a 1978 renovation, a large amount of Buddhist relics and treasures, such as pearls, agate, coral, crystal and paintings, were found in the Three Pagodas. In the top floor of Qianxun Pagoda alone, several hundred Buddha and Avalokiteshvara sculptures were discovered, some of which were made of pure gold.
Today, the Three Pagodas are a major attraction for both Buddhist pilgrims and tourists from around the world.
Prescriptions & Usage:
佛塔 (Fota) Pagoda
Fota, or pagoda, originates from the Sanskrit word “stupa,” a dome-shaped monument used chiefly to house Buddhist relics in India.
After Buddhism was introduced into China around AD 67, pagodas began to appear in the country, but they blended the original stupa with the architectural styles of Chinese towers and pavilions. For instance, the pavilion-like pagodas all had a stupa as the roof crown.
Early Chinese pagodas were mostly built with wood. Traditionally having an odd number of levels, such pagodas were usually quite tall and therefore susceptible to fire during thunderstorms.
People thus began to build multi-eaved brick pagodas, characterized by a high principal story with five to 13 eaves above it and a spire perching atop.
One of the best examples of the brick pagodas is perhaps the Small Wild Goose Pagoda, built during the Tang Dynasty in Xi’an, in northwestern China.
Still later, China introduced several other types of pagodas from India, such as inverted-bowl pagoda or Lamaist pagoda and vajrasana pagoda. All adopted some Chinese characteristics later on.
Abundant in variety, pagodas in the country have long been deemed a gem in ancient Chinese architecture.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
